1. Technical Field of the Invention
This invention relates to paintball loaders, and more particularly, to a paintball loader which forcibly and rapidly feeds paintballs to a paintball gun.
2. Description of Related Art
The use of paintball guns has increased over the past few years. One very popular game utilizing these paintball guns is a war game having two teams of players trying to capture one another's flag. The war game is played on a large field with opposing home bases at each end. Each team's flag is located at the player's home base. In addition, all of the players have a paintball gun that shoots paintballs. These paintballs are gelatin-covered spherical capsules filled with paint. During play of the game, the players on each team advance towards the opposing team's base in hopes of stealing the opposing team's flag, without being eliminated from the war game. A player is eliminated from the game when the player is hit by a paintball fired from an opposing player's gun. When the paintball hits a player, a "splat" of paint is left on the player.
The war games have grown in popularity and sophistication, requiring the use of more elaborate equipment. One such improvement is seen in the use of semi-automatic and automatic paintball guns, allowing the rapid dispersal of paintballs. Since these automatic guns shoot paintballs at a rapid rate, paintball loaders are required to store a large number of paintballs and rapidly feed the paintballs into the paintball guns. However, existing paintball loaders are unable to reliably feed paintballs to the paintball guns at the rapid rate demanded by the guns.
Typically, an existing paintball loader includes a housing which is placed on an upper portion of a paintball gun. The housing is shaped to hold a large quantity of paintballs. At the bottom of the housing is an outlet tube through which the paintballs drop by the force of gravity. The outlet tube leads to an inlet tube located on the upper portion of the gun.
During the operation of existing paintball loaders, paintballs sequentially drop by gravity through the outlet tube into the inlet tube of the gun. The inlet tube directs each paintball into the firing chamber of the gun, where the paintball is propelled outwardly from the gun by compressed air. However, the existing paintball loaders function properly to feed the paintballs into the gun only if the gun and loader are held in an approximately vertical (upright) position. This is because the paintballs fall from the loader into the outlet tube, by the force of gravity. If, during the course of a game, the player holds the gun sideways or upside down, the loader will not function properly.
Additionally, during the operation of delivering the paintballs to the gun, jams occasionally occur in the loaders. The jams result in the failure to supply paintballs to the gun, requiring the player to take corrective action by, for example, shaking the gun to clear the jam, or striking the loader to dislodge the jammed paintball. Of course, jams are not desirable since players must divert their attention from firing paintballs to clearing the jammed loader. Therefore, to increase the performance of a paintball gun, a paintball loader is needed which reliably and forcibly delivers paintballs to a paintball gun at a rapid rate, while preventing or automatically removing paintball jams.
Although there are no known prior art teachings of a solution to the aforementioned deficiency and shortcoming such as that disclosed herein, prior art references that discuss subject matter that bears some relation to matters discussed herein are U.S. Pat. No. 5,282,454 to Bell et al. (Bell '454) and U.S. Pat. No. 5,816,232 to Bell (Bell '232).
Bell '454 discloses a bulk loader for a semi-automatic paintball gun which includes a storage housing positioned on a paintball gun. The housing includes a bottom outlet opening and a feed tube located at the bottom outlet opening and connected to an outer end of an in-feed elbow on the gun. During operation of the loader, a series of paintballs fall into the feed tube and are vertically stacked for sequential delivery to the gun through an inner end of the in-feed elbow. If a paintball jam occurs within the storage housing, a void is created at a top end of the feed tube above the downwardly moving paintball stack. An optical sensor detects the void and actuates a motor driven agitator member within the housing, adjacent to its bottom outlet opening. The agitator member engages and shifts the jammed paintballs to permit additional paintballs to fall through the housing outlet opening into the feed tube. When the jam is cleared, the sensor detects the filling of the tube void and turns the agitator member off. Although Bell '454 provides some protection against jams, Bell '454 suffers from the disadvantage of not effectively removing all jams. Additionally, Bell '454 merely discloses a gravity-feed loader, which does not allow paintballs to be forcibly delivered to a gun at high rates, which is needed for semi-automatic and automatic paintball guns. The optical sensor disclosed in Bell '454 is also not reliable when subjected to the harsh treatment normally seen in paintball wars.
Bell '232 also discloses a feed loader for a paintball gun. The feed loader includes a rotatable paddle positioned in an interior space which pushes paintballs out of a housing of the loader and through an interior passageway. The paintballs are pushed into the interior passageway and drop into a vertical out-feed tube where the paintballs form a paintball stack. During the firing of the paintball gun, the paintball stack is depleted until a sensor detects the absence of a paintball at a specified location within the out-feed tube. Upon detecting the absence, the sensor activates a motor which rotates the paddle pushing the paintballs through the interior passageway and into the out-feed tube, where they replenish the paintball stack. When the stack is fully replenished, the sensor detects the presence of a paintball at the specified location and deactivates the motor, which stops the paddle. However, Bell '232 does not teach or suggest actively and forcibly feeding the paintballs into the paintball gun. Bell '232 merely discloses utilizing a paddle to push the paintballs toward an opening leading to the out-feed tube. The paintballs still drop, by the force of gravity to the paintball stack. Bell '232 suffers from the disadvantage of utilizing gravity to provide the force to deliver the paintballs to the paintball gun. Bell '232 does not teach or suggest a device to actively force the paintballs through the out-feed tube.
Review of each of the foregoing references reveals no disclosure or suggestion of an apparatus as that described and claimed herein. Thus, it would be a distinct advantage to have an apparatus which forces the paintballs at a rapid rate into the paintball gun, while simultaneously and automatically removing jams during the operation of the paintball gun. It is an object of the present invention to provide such an apparatus.